QuickTake: The Lara Croft exhibition in Derby made the case for more gaming exhibitions
From design documents to certain books
July 23 marked the start of Tomb Raider's 30th anniversary in Derby, with a free Lara Croft Exhibition at Pickford House. On display until November, visitors can see a range of artefacts across three rooms, which include original box art, PlayStation programming documents, and even an original PC that helped to make the first five Tomb Raider games.
I was asked to write a couple of interpretation boards for it by the Exhibition's organiser, Luke Earle, which you'll be able to see in the first room. I attended the opening before it was made available to the public, along with Core Design alumni such as Richard Morton, Andy Sandham, Martin Gibbins, Del Leigh-Gilchrist, Tom Scutt, Ben Twose, and the voice of Lara Croft from TR2 and TR3, Judith Gibbins.
A foundation for more gaming exhibitions
The exhibition is filled with artefacts that Luke Earle has collected over the years, as well as some from fans, Crystal Dynamics, and the former Core Design team, such as Del Leigh-Gilchrist and Martin Gibbins, who have donated original design documents, PlayStation development kits, Larazade bottles, and champagne.
As I walked into this exhibition for the first time before visitors arrived, I saw the interpretation board I had written that sits alongside the first design document for Tomb Raider, a photo of the team, and more in a cabinet, pictured above. There's also a board that describes the second book, which might make an appearance at the exhibition in the near future.
Everyone I spoke to who worked at Core Design was amazed at how the games have evolved to be shown at an exhibition, when they were simply trying to get them out for Thanksgiving in the late 90s.
But it goes back to a point that I said to almost everyone when making the second book, and coincidentally, something that Del Leigh-Gilchrist and Tom Scutt both said to me at the exhibition. We're all getting older, and telling the story of how these games came to be will only get harder.
In addition, with the absence of physical media discs from Sony coming in 2028, it's going to be harder to preserve games that we're yet to know about. It's why it's incredibly important that exhibitions like this should exist, and why more should occur.
Around the world, we see plenty of events that celebrate film, the theatre, and soundtracks. But we rarely see the same for gaming that the general public can walk around and look at the history of a certain series. This one in Derby is proof that people will come, and it should be a wake-up call to those in the gaming industry that there's an opportunity here to celebrate long-standing franchises that people still care about.
Gallery
